About Omniclimate

( last updated: Jun 16, 2012 )

The author of this blog is Maurizio Morabito.

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I do not “believe” in the IPCC, in the AGU, in the Hadley Centre, in 2,500 scientists and experts, in Svensmark, in Lindzen, in Crichton, in yourself, in SciAm, in American Scientist, in any skeptic or AGW believer.

I take everybody’s remarks as a step forward in the discussion and in the understanding of this or any other issue.

From that, I extract, polish, and sometimes destroy my own opinion.

(following text is by Willis Eschenbach. Republished with the author’s consent)

I also think that increasing GHGs [greenhous gases] will warm the earth … but that is not the real question to me.The real question is, how much it will warm the earth. To date, I have not seen any “useful quantitative results” regarding that question […] …

Once those quantitative results are in, we can proceed to the next question: is a warmer earth better or worse on balance?

The globe has warmed quite a bit since the 1600s, and in general this has been of benefit to humans. The sea level rise from the historical warming has not been a significant problem. In addition, a warmer world is predicted to be a wetter world, which overall can only be a good thing.

So, will warming be a problem, or a benefit? This is a very open question, and one which will be difficult to answer as some areas will win and some will lose. To date, however, recent warming seems to be occurring outside the tropics, in the night-time, in the winter … this does not seem like a bad thing.

And at some future date when those questions are answered, we can proceed to the final question, viz: If GHGs are determined to be a major cause of the warming (as opposed to land-use changes, or black carbon on snow, or dark colored aerosols, etc) and if we determine that the warming will be on balance a negative occurrence, is there a cost-effective way to reduce the GHGs, or are we better off putting our money into adaptation?

Until we can answer all of those questions, we should restrict ourselves to actions which will be of value whether or not there is future warming.

The key is to realize that all of the problems that Al Gore is so shrill about are here now with us today – floods, heat waves, famine, rising sea levels, droughts, cold spells, and all of the apocalyptic catalog are occurring as I write this.

Anything we can do to insulate the world’s population from these climate problems will be of use to everyone no matter what the future climate holds.

I just checked the WordPress code I have used (see below). It is standard HTML to show a picture from one site into another. Technically speaking, I have not copied your picture (as clearly indicated by the “src” tag).

The WP code also contains the link to the original URL. If you don’t want people to use it, take it down yourself.

I think the trouble is that there is little publicity (and perhaps not enough research) into the micro-effects of global warming (the text above agrees that there is warming, though quantifying is notoriously difficult, as is predicting impact). Perhaps there are two main reasons for this (undoubtedly there are more): firstly, as you illustrate with your emphases above, the main concerns of most humans are that the human population alone survives. However, from the point of view of evolution, no organism survives uniquely. We are all elements of systems and processes that produced and sustain us. Therefore considering our survival without attempting to understand the impact upon, for instance, micro-organisms, is not very effective. Secondly, and perhaps just as cogently, and I think you recognise this, the issue of climate change runs alongside difficult questions of development: China’s one child policy has had an enormous impact on climate – by reducing the potential population there and therefore reducing the impact of an increased population. But ‘the global North’ – liberal democracies in Europe, Australasia and America – has no such restriction, excludes military pollution and resource use from its calculations on impact, and otherwise shifts the goalposts when it suits it.
One thing that I notice about this entire debate is how heated it is – pun intended. This in itself is indicative of a growing problem – I’d link it, unlikely as it may seem – to the faceless and instant nature of online communication fora (like this one) that cause people to say things they would never say to one another face to face (unless in a rage or in war).
I therefore hope that whatever comes of this is a civil and well-mannered conversation between two individuals who show mutual respect. I am afraid, however, that, given the nature of the comments I have seen before on commentaries, this might be a panglossian belief. Nevertheless, I wish you well.

One theory NOT pursued to its logical conclusion is the one which answers the question; “Where is all that water coming from that causes floods whenever and where-ever it rains world-wide?”
When I grew up to schooling age some 60 years ago, my teachers told me that the Amazon Catchment feeding the Amazon river held 50% of all the white water in the world and that it rained torentially all over the catchment for three hours solid every day in living memory. The crescent formed by the division of the Fresh water (light blue) and the Salt water (darker blue) some 200KM out in the Ocean was remarked upon by some if the early astronauts circling the earth.
Now the catchment is denuded of vegetation to such an extend that it fails to rain in the catchment for weeks on end.
Logic tells me that the Pacific’s Rate of Evaporation will not have changed, but the crescent in the ocean extends NOW only 90 KM out and is brown instead of blue. The Non Precipitated water from the PACIFIC IS CARRIED ALONG MINGLING IN ALL THE WEATHERPATTERNS WORLD WIDE.
THE CRUX BEING, THERE IS NO OTHER RIVERSYSTEM IN THE WORLD CAPABLE OF COPING WITH AN INCREASE OF AN EXTRA 25% OF ALL THE WHITE WATER IN THE WORLD ON TOP OF ITS NORMAL FLOW SO FLOODS ARE NOW COMMON.
United Nations should start an urgent AMAZON CATCHMENT reaforresting exercize and return the world climate back to where it was 35 years ago.
I rest my, Kees.

Mans CO2 emmissions can’t possibly accumulate in the atmosphere within the naturally cycling volume of 90-100GT that exists between the oceans and the atmosphere. It must however change the balance of this cycle, reducing (by replacing) some of the naturally expelled CO2. This results in there being a slight positive partial pressure of CO2 in the atmosphere, and I calculate this as being in the region of 16 microbars, as shown in item 7 in this paper:

This means that the level of CO2 in the atmosphere is 16ppm higher than it would be without mans CO2 emmissions, regardless of whether atmospheric CO2 is rising, constant, or falling – based on current emmission levels. The effect of this has got to be tiny.

Anybody can argue against something, but it doesn’t mean their argument deserves equal weight. Your claim that AGW is logically impossible is stupid and ignorant beyond belief. Either that, or you are the smartest person on the planet. Hmm. Wonder which it is?

I am sorry, senator, but even if “anybody can argue against something”, there is no value whatsoever in you writing that my “claim” is “stupid and ignorant beyond belief” since you provide no argument at all to justify your statement.

Since you have offered this statement as demonstrative of your overall thoughts on climate change, I will offer my reactions here. I assume that the long quote you offer from Mr. Eschenbach summarizes your own thoughts — after all, you would not have quoted him at such length and without a disavowal unless you were in general agreement with his statement.

His first point is that:

“The real question is, how much it will warm the earth. To date, I have not seen any “useful quantitative results” regarding that question […] …”

If he has not seen any useful quantitative results, then he has not read the IPCC AR4 WG1 report. It provides a great many quantitative estimates of the amount of warming that we can expect to see over the next century. If you object to those estimates, then it is incumbent upon you to specify the nature of your objection.

His next question is:

“is a warmer earth better or worse on balance?”

He then offers his own answer to the question:

“The globe has warmed quite a bit since the 1600s, and in general this has been of benefit to humans.”

I object to this claim as lacking any historical basis. The history of humankind since the 1600s is enormously complex. There has been great progress, but most of this progress is not attributable to climate change. I would assign most of the credit for the improvements in the human condition to technological advances. There are many other factors to consider as well, but to blithely state that, since things have gotten better in the last 400 years, and the climate has warmed in the last 400 years (actually, it’s more like the last 250 years), therefore the improvement must be due to the warming — that’s absurd.

“The sea level rise from the historical warming has not been a significant problem.”

This is correct, but the sea level rise in the past is far less than the sea level rise predicted for the future. To suggest that a future sea level rise of, say, 50 cm will not be a problem because the sea level rise of a few cm in the last few centuries has not been a problem is absurd.

” a warmer world is predicted to be a wetter world, which overall can only be a good thing.”

Nonsense. Tell that to the people of Bangladesh, who regularly suffer catastrophic floods. Flooding is a big problem in many areas of the tropics; if flooding increases due to climate change, then it will most definitely NOT be a good thing.

Moreover, increased precipitation must offset increased temperatures if it is to be beneficial. Detailed studies of the American Great Plains demonstrate that, while precipitation will increase slightly, evaporation rates will increase by more because of elevated temperatures. The conclusion is that agricultural output from the Great Plains will fall. A slightly different problem arises in the California Central Valley, which is currently irrigated by snowmelt from the Sierra Nevada. Predictions show increased precipitation in the Sierras, but it will take the form of rain rather than snow, which means that it will run off more quickly. Thus, the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers, which provide the water for the Central Valley, will flood during the winter months and go dry in the summer months. The irrigation water is needed during the summer months, not the winter months. Therefore, agricultural output of the California Central Valley is predicted to fall.

On and on it goes. Yes, there will be some overall improvements, but there will also be overall damage. This doesn’t mean that we simply shrug our shoulders and conclude that climate change might be good or bad with equal probabilities. Humanity has trillions of dollars invested in an infrastructure that was built with assumptions about the prevailing weather. Port facilities were built on the assumption that sea level would not rise. Buildings were constructed with the assumption that future temperatures would be similar to past temperatures. If you change those values, a great deal of infrastructure must be retrofitted to accommodate those climatic changes. How many trillions of dollars will that cost? We can be certain that a change of this magnitude will impose enormous costs upon humanity.

“To date, however, recent warming seems to be occurring outside the tropics, in the night-time, in the winter … this does not seem like a bad thing.”

He’s right about the concentration of the warming. But his sheepish statement that “this does not seem like a bad thing” is no basis for policymaking. We don’t plan the future based on uninformed guesses — we plan based on rational analysis of the facts. That rational analysis has been carried out many times in many different ways, and the conclusions are always that climate change will be expensive.

“If GHGs are determined to be a major cause of the warming (as opposed to land-use changes, or black carbon on snow, or dark colored aerosols, etc) and if we determine that the warming will be on balance a negative occurrence, is there a cost-effective way to reduce the GHGs, or are we better off putting our money into adaptation?”

This is a good policy question to be discussing, although his subjunctive clauses have already been resolved in the affirmative, which leads us to this reduce his question to this:

“is there a cost-effective way to reduce the GHGs, or are we better off putting our money into adaptation?”

Such analyses are still in early stages, but we do know that, depending upon the magnitude of climate change, direct adaptation will be staggeringly expensive. For example, sea level rise will inundate low-lying coastal regions. A great many of the world’s largest cities lie on the seacoast. Can you imagine the cost of relocating say, the city of Miami (average elevation: 2 meters)? What about the Netherlands, which are already in many places under sea level? What will it cost if we write off the entire country? And what about the loss of farmland in the deltas of many of the world’s great rivers? How much will it cost us to replace that farmland?

These costs have not been figured because they are catastrophic, obviously amounting to many trillions of dollars. Therefore, any mitigating policies whose costs amount to billions look pretty attractive at this point.

You could argue that, since we don’t have reliable calculations of cost versus benefit, we should take no action. If so, I would counterargue that lack of complete information is no justification for preferring inaction over action. Reality doesn’t care if we dawdle — it will proceed apace. We simply have to consider the evidence available to us and act with appropriate judgement.

Erasmussimo – “If he has not seen any useful quantitative results, then he has not read the IPCC AR4 WG1 report”

In the TAR, the range of possible temperature rises was 1.4 to 5.8 Celsius. In the 4AR, that range has become 1.1 to 6.4 C. How much will increasing GHGs warm the earth? Who knows? What’s the usefulness of a range that keeps expanding?

““The globe has warmed quite a bit since the 1600s, and in general this has been of benefit to humans.” I object to this claim as lacking any historical basis.”

That’s funny as there’s an enormous amount of disasters attributable to cold weather and cooling climates. It is not by chance that the warm periods have always been labelled positively, eg the Holocene Optimum.

“therefore the improvement must be due to the warming — that’s absurd”

Yes, in fact it’s a straw man that is perfectly absent from the original text. If the weather’s nice it’s easier to score at soccer, yet nobody will claim that the final result “must be due to nice weather”.

“the sea level rise in the past is far less than the sea level rise predicted for the future”

“predicted” is the word

“”a warmer world is predicted to be a wetter world, which overall can only be a good thing.” Nonsense. Tell that to the people of Bangladesh, who regularly suffer catastrophic floods”

“overall” is the word

“agricultural output of the California Central Valley is predicted to fall”

Yes, yes, until something unexpected will turn up changing the prediction. That’s science.

“a great deal of infrastructure must be retrofitted to accommodate those climatic changes”

We are moving into policy now. About that, everybody’s entitled an opinion. Will adaptation cost more or less than cutting CO2 emissions? I am inclined to think otherwise, also in terms of political costs.

One might argue that in hindsight, it would have been far less costly for all had the USA intervened in WWII in 1939. On the other hand, without the Pearl Harbor incident, the American morale and willingness to fight to the end (between 1942 and 1989, in fact) would not have been there.

“We don’t plan the future based on uninformed guesses — we plan based on rational analysis of the facts”

If only! Look at COP15, and despair!

““is there a cost-effective way to reduce the GHGs, or are we better off putting our money into adaptation?” Such analyses are still in early stages”

And that’s what we should all be discussing. Unfortunately, most otherwise knowledgeable people are still at the believers-vs-denier stage and unlikely to move forward an inch.

“Can you imagine the cost of relocating say, the city of Miami (average elevation: 2 meters)? What about the Netherlands, which are already in many places under sea level? What will it cost if we write off the entire country? And what about the loss of farmland in the deltas of many of the world’s great rivers? How much will it cost us to replace that farmland?”

Funny again…you mention the Netherlands, able to provide plenty of expertise on how to deal with a sea that is higher than the “dry” land. Last time I checked, all that effort didn’t bankrupt that country, not resulted in catastrophes.

“You could argue that, since we don’t have reliable calculations of cost versus benefit, we should take no action”

But I don’t. I argue, with Willis, that we should immediately put in place whatever will help anyway. About all the rest, I would place my trust in the democratic process, and if the majority is convinced about a carbon tax, so be it. Every other intervention (non-democratic), I will always be totally against.

“n the TAR, the range of possible temperature rises was 1.4 to 5.8 Celsius. In the 4AR, that range has become 1.1 to 6.4 C. How much will increasing GHGs warm the earth? Who knows? What’s the usefulness of a range that keeps expanding?”

So you take two data points, draw a line through them, and extrapolate. That’s not logical. Then you execute a major logical blunder: you quote IPCC AR4’s estimate of how much the earth will warm, and then you ask, “Who knows how much the earth will warm?” Duh! You just quoted the IPCC!!!

You might have a point if their numbers were all over the map. But in fact, the numbers are pretty close. Moreover, the AR4 numbers represent the additional knowledge that was gained since publication of the TAR. Hence we now have a fairly reliable estimate: 1.1ºC to 6.4ºC. Note that this range does NOT include 0.0ºC — the earth will definitely be warming over the next century. And the upper limit of that range is so high as to present us with the very real prospect of catastrophically large changes in climate and sea level.

“That’s funny as there’s an enormous amount of disasters attributable to cold weather and cooling climates. It is not by chance that the warm periods have always been labelled positively, eg the Holocene Optimum.”

I am aghast at the simple-minded claim you make that warm means good and cold means bad. Yes, there are lots of cases in which a warmer climate is preferable to a colder climate. But there are also lots of cases in which a colder climate is preferable to a warmer climate. I already presented you with specific cases — river deltas, the American Great Plains, and the California Central Valley — in which a warming climate will lead to expensive damages. Yet you simply wave these specific examples off with a blithe smile. I suggest that evidence is more convincing that smug assurances.

“Yes, in fact it’s a straw man that is perfectly absent from the original text.”

False. Here’s the statement: “The globe has warmed quite a bit since the 1600s, and in general this has been of benefit to humans.”

Next, you note that sea levels are predicted to rise in the coming century. Good for you. I’m glad to see you conceding that point.

You claim that overall benefits of warming are positive. Yet you offer absolutely nothing in the way of evidence to support your claim. I have offered specific examples of how a warming climate will be injurious. You have offered nothing in return — just wild claims.

Next, you dismiss my point about falling agricultural output in the California Central Valley with this statement:

“Yes, yes, until something unexpected will turn up changing the prediction. That’s science.”

Please, reveal to me what that “something unexpected” will be. If you can’t cite anything, then why do you even bother writing something down? Your statement is utterly meaningless without substantiation. Offer some evidence — not just your own fantasies.

“We are moving into policy now. About that, everybody’s entitled an opinion. Will adaptation cost more or less than cutting CO2 emissions? I am inclined to think otherwise, also in terms of political costs.”

Yes, you’re certainly entitled to your own opinion. But merely declaring that Option A will be more expensive than Option B — without offering the slightest whiff of evidence in support of your claim — means that your opinion is without foundation.

“One might argue that in hindsight, it would have been far less costly for all had the USA intervened in WWII in 1939.”

For ALL? You honestly think that WWII could have come out better without American participation? I’d love to hear THAT scenario!

“And that’s what we should all be discussing. Unfortunately, most otherwise knowledgeable people are still at the believers-vs-denier stage and unlikely to move forward an inch.”

Here we are in agreement. We need to stop wasting time arguing with idiots about WHETHER anthropogenic climate change is real and start worrying about what we’re going to do about it. There are three broad strategies available to us:

I agree that all three options are highly problematic. Preliminary evaluations suggest that Option 1 is the cheapest. But I agree that further evaluation is immensely important.

“Funny again…you mention the Netherlands, able to provide plenty of expertise on how to deal with a sea that is higher than the “dry” land. Last time I checked, all that effort didn’t bankrupt that country, not resulted in catastrophes.”

The Nederlandish efforts at dealing with sea level have extended over hundreds of years, and they are not without failures: there have been destructive floods on a regular basis, the most recent in 1953. Current plans call for flood control measures costing about a billion euros a year. No, this does not bankrupt the Nederlandish economy, but it’s just one more cost to add to all the others all over the world.

“I argue, with Willis, that we should immediately put in place whatever will help anyway. About all the rest, I would place my trust in the democratic process, and if the majority is convinced about a carbon tax, so be it. Every other intervention (non-democratic), I will always be totally against.”

We’re in agreement here, although I would caution that complex scientific questions cannot be answered by the average voter. That’s why the USA has had for over 140 years the National Academy of Sciences to advise Congress on such matters. And the recommendations of the NAS are quite clear: we must do something to reduce emissions of CO2.

He’s right about the concentration of the warming. But his sheepish statement that “this does not seem like a bad thing” is no basis for policymaking. We don’t plan the future based on uninformed guesses — we plan based on rational analysis of the facts. That rational analysis has been carried out many times in many different ways, and the conclusions are always that climate change will be expensive.

The scientific and other materials I have read to date do not appear clear that warming will create mass disruption of life on Earth (as I understand your question). There are arguments each way on this issue, but I seem to recall seeing materials on ecology and so forth when I was in university studying environmental engineering (more than 20 years ago) that there has generally been greater diversity in times of warmth. I also seem to recall seeing information that indicated larger creatures tended to be more prevalent during cold (glacial) periods as a means to better maintain body heat. Then too, there’s also the issue of physical space. How many creatures are well-equipped to live in exceptionally cold climates? If a glaciation occurs, and glaciers advance, with conditions becoming too cold for many species to survive in those areas, cold-sensitive creatures will likely migrate elsewhere, to warmer areas. If so, conditions become a bit more crowded and competition for more limited food supplies would seem to possibly become the limiting factor. It would seem that the reverse situation would provide potential for greater food supplies for all creatures, starting with plants and small animals. For example, in the past several decades, as hunting is restricted year by year (whether I don’t approve or do means little), we see increasing numbers of deer struck by cars on the roadways, and we also see increasing numbers of near-starving deer eating [expensive] landscaping close to homes during relatively harsh winters. This is presumably due to overpopulation and overcrowding of their ranges, as well as human infringment on large tracts of undeveloped space, forcing the deer to forage farther.+1
+1

The scientific and other materials I have read to date do not appear clear that warming will create mass disruption of life on Earth (as I understand your question). There are arguments each way on this issue, but I seem to recall seeing materials on ecology and so forth when I was in university studying environmental engineering (more than 20 years ago) that there has generally been greater diversity in times of warmth. I also seem to recall seeing information that indicated larger creatures tended to be more prevalent during cold (glacial) periods as a means to better maintain body heat. Then too, there’s also the issue of physical space. How many creatures are well-equipped to live in exceptionally cold climates? If a glaciation occurs, and glaciers advance, with conditions becoming too cold for many species to survive in those areas, cold-sensitive creatures will likely migrate elsewhere, to warmer areas. If so, conditions become a bit more crowded and competition for more limited food supplies would seem to possibly become the limiting factor. It would seem that the reverse situation would provide potential for greater food supplies for all creatures, starting with plants and small animals. For example, in the past several decades, as hunting is restricted year by year (whether I don’t approve or do means little), we see increasing numbers of deer struck by cars on the roadways, and we also see increasing numbers of near-starving deer eating [expensive] landscaping close to homes during relatively harsh winters. This is presumably due to overpopulation and overcrowding of their ranges, as well as human infringment on large tracts of undeveloped space, forcing the deer to forage farther.
+1

I wonder why we are still so scared of the weather? I only worried about the weather when I looked out the door in the moring. Hat or not? Big coat? People are insane now, and babble IPCC rubbish as if it were fact. Amazing.

Two questions: Where can I get a copy of the CIA document entitled “A Study of Climatological Research as it Pertains to Intelligence Problems”? I am looking for the report in the CIA online reading room. But I could not find the document. I found only one reference to the US Library of Congress. In the book “The Weather Conspiracy – The Coming of the New Ice Age” is written that there are two CIA documents concerning “global cooling” exist. What is the title of the second study? If you can help me, I thank you very much in advance.

Are you referring to the 1976 CIA report that was mentioned in several newspaper articles, and was supposedly released on May 3, 1976?

I, too, am looking for a copy of that report and would very much appreciate any information about it. I found mention of it in at least two newspaper articles (both available in google news archives) and a Time Magazine article:

Comment » Opinion & Analysis » Email to a friendEmail to AuthorPrint RSS Text Size:The Irish Times – Wednesday, December 2, 2009Let the movement’s motto be: think globally, act tangentially
In this section »
EMERSONNEWTON’S OPTIC: HACKERS HAVE uncovered the following e-mail exchange between two climatologists at the University of East Antrim. Please note that this may only be a computer model of an e-mail exchange between two climatologists at the University of East Antrim, in which case it proves nothing.

From: Rupert

Just back from the Vancouver conference, terrible jet-lag. Not looking forward to next month’s trip to Tokyo. Which reminds me – how’s the stratospheric CO2 study going?

From: Jeremy

Badly. According to the latest results, Earth will be hotter than Venus before our funding runs out, which is going to be tricky to fit to the data. We need to re-examine our assumptions and project some new trends over the next decade of our careers. Any suggestions?

From: Rupert

I think “global slowing” has potential. The Earth’s rotation is slowing down due to tidal friction with the Moon. If it continues unchecked days will become noticeably longer, destroying civilisation as we know it. Levels of tiredness will rise, calendar firms will go under and confused badgers will wander into town and bite people on the ankles.

From: Jeremy

True, but without a man-made cause there’s no moral dimension. The Earth spins west to east – we need to find some sort of human activity that exerts a net force in the opposite direction.

From: Rupert

I hear love makes the world go round.

From: Jeremy

Please, this is a serious matter. How about shipping? A lot of supertankers and container ships come west fully loaded and go back to Asia empty. The extra force required to propel them westwards is counter-rotational, and cumulative, so it doesn’t matter if it’s too small to measure. We could call it “the wheel-house effect”.

From: Rupert

Perfect – you’ve got oil, globalisation, consumer guilt and fear of China all in there. Don’t forget that developing countries will suffer most from imperceptibly lengthening days, because they have cheaper watches. But we need scope for personal redemption if we want popular appeal. What can ordinary people do to stop man-made global slowing?

From: Jeremy

Anything that exerts an eastwards acceleration at a tangent to the equator – running on the spot, blowing really hard. Let the movement’s motto be: “Think globally, act tangentially”.

From: Rupert

We should have some technical solutions as well to get business involved. Maybe rotation-neutral sailing ships or rotation-offsetting ships that always sail east. Or we could just go for the traditional giant mirrors in orbit. I’ll get the students to knock up a graphic.

From: Jeremy

What other well-funded areas of research do you foresee opening up in this exciting new academic field?

From: Rupert

I do believe there’ll be opportunities in vertigo biology, enormous horizontally mounted rocketry and the extremely accurate measurement of the Earth’s rotation, or “precision geochronometrology”, as we’ll be calling it on the grant application. We should organise a conference on the subject, somewhere nice and warm.

From: Jeremy

Might I recommend Spinalonga?

From: Rupert

Which just leaves one little problem. Because tidal friction is also pushing the moon away, the rate of global slowing is itself slowing. What do we say about that?

This independently verified clean energy technology produces electricity at the astonishingly low cost of 1 cent per kilowatt hour. As reported by both CNN and the New York Times:

Check out above link to a 2 minute youtube video of a CNN report. What are the odds that the independent testimony below is fraudulent (not bloody likely unless you are a paranoid conspiracy theorist)? Here is a silver bullet technology: clean cheap and abundant energy.

In a joint statement, Dr. K.V. Ramanujachary, Rowan University Meritorious Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Dr. Amos Mugweru, Assistant Professor of Chemistry, and Dr. Peter Jansson P.E., Associate Professor of Engineering said, “In independent tests conducted over the past three months involving 10 solid fuels made by us from commercially-available chemicals, our team of engineering and chemistry professors, staff, and students at Rowan University has independently and consistently generated energy in excesses ranging from 1.2 times to 6.5 times the maximum theoretical heat available through known chemical reactions.”

Basically it calls for climate panic mongers in government to stop monging climate panic (and, specifically, to stop spending UK taxpayer moneys to do so). Not many signatures yet, but the interesting thing is that when I tried to publish a similar one eighteen months ago, it was turned down. Is the tide turning? or is it just a back eddy?
Keep up the good stuff on your great blog
D

Your opening statement would move things forward were all to share that outlook.
I believe this paper by Richard Lindzen [the Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorlogy at MIT would aid a big step forward if it were widely read. His comments have always been measured and judicious, unlike those of his critics.http://www.heartland.org/events/newyork09/pdfs/lindzen.pdf

[…] well, if you don't get what it is about from that title, please make the effort of reading the About page. I am proud of the fact that I can draw in several thousands reads a month whilst posting […]

I Like Mark G’s perspective (15 Mar, 2009). The sheer scale of human culture can’t help but impact global cycles and climate – just look at satellite shots of our smog plumes. What’s needed on the technical side is more and better science, not more argument. On the policy side we need a sensible “lean” in the right direction – conservation of resources, curbing of excessive “footprint” activities and diversity of energy sources.

As a scientist reading the literature on a monthly basis I can say that the proper science IS being done. We all want to have a voice but leave the data and interpretation to the experts. Our place as laymen and world citizens is to decide policy; what to do, if anything, about the results.

There is legitimate scientific debate regarding the size of the effect of human created warming, but not much disagreement over its existence and that it has a measurable effect.

Remember seeing the first amazing images of the earth from the moon? The most striking thing to me was how thin Earth’s atmosphere appears; about one quarter of 1% of the Earth’s diameter, much less than the ratio of an chicken egg’s shell to the total size of the egg.

Here is one way to look at it: Burning coal, gas and other fuels create energy by breaking carbon bonds. The carbon then is converted to either gases like CO2, CO, CS2 (the amount of all carbon and sulfur containing gases can be calculated in carbon dioxide equivalents) containing gases, etc or solids like soot, polyaromatics, creosote, etc. This much we know; carbon based gases are greenhouse gases. So its relatively straight forward to calculate the amount of carbon based fuels we burn and the amount of carbon products released as a results. It is a significant amount.

Burning fuels doesn’t change carbon to other types of atoms, only nuclear reaction can do this. So once carbon, always carbon.

There is a natural flux in the amount of natural carbon in the atmosphere from volcanoes, forest fires, etc. The issue is whether or not man made carbon will cause a tipping point beyond which major changes in Earth’s surface and lower atmospheric temperatures, i.e. significant ice melts, changes in weather patterns, mass migrations, etc. The oceans can absorb some of the CO2 but become acidic as a result.

The science is complex so using every day common sense, gut feelings, political commentary and laymen interpretation to interpret the data doesn’t work. Leave the science to the scientist, then use good sense and politics to decide what policies are appropriate.

Finally, truth in disclosure, I do believe that there are good amateur scientist, that good science need not occur in an ivory tower, that some science is bad science and scientist need to do a better job of translating complex subjects in to concepts all of us can understand. We NEED as much OPEN debate on what we should do about it as we can get.

The details of the science are complex. Normal people can, however, understand it when it is put forth in an honest, intelligible way. It is no different than any other science. They are all complex, but understandable if the scientists actually want to be understood. The problem with AGW is that the process is 90% political and 10% science.

The fact is that a scientist’s own high level of brilliance and expertise in one area can blind him or her as to the importance of his or her work to the overall understanding of reality.

The issue at hand is that there really has been no open debate until recently. Any dissenter from the accepted opinion was pushed aside, no matter how valid the critique or qualified the dissenter. The IPCC speaks and everyone is supposed to listen. In reality, the IPCC is not a scientific organization, but rather a political organization promoting the United Nations. It uses the credibility of respected scientists to push a pre-determined agenda.

Hi Dan,
Sorry for the delayed response but I appreciate your comments. Its not that scientists don’t want to be understood in the “lay” press. It’s just not on the agenda for most scientists who are concerned daily about the ever increasing competition for grant money (the life line of a scientist), publications, conferences and the peer review process. Incidentally, at many conferences on the topic there is decent. After all, it is often the dissenter that wins the Nobel Prize. Who wouldn’t want to be the one who proves that global warming theories are wrong? Alas, it is the data, peer review, and expert interpretation that speaks loudest. So far the data show that we are experiencing global warming.

I think scientist NEED to do a better job of communicating to the general public. This SHOULD be the job and to some degree is done by the AASS (American Academy of Sciences), NSF, other prestigious scientific organizations and the Presidential Science Adviser.

There is a lot of chatter on talk radio and TV by non-scientists about how cool this spring, summer and fall were/are in North America, therefor how could there be global warming? However, this was an extremely warm year for the Southern Hemisphere and global changes in climate seems to create global disturbances in the weather patterns. Whether or not that is what we are seeing one thing is clear; it’s hard to measure the effect of climate change on a time scale of a year. Without a depth of knowledge of the subject, trying to apply simple intuition to understanding of global climate changes probably doesn’t work.

The overriding fact to remember is that there is as yet no actual scientific evidence refuting AGW theory, despite the best efforts of home pencil pushers putting their own spins on the stats. It’s nice that people want to ‘debate’, but how do you debate a fact? AGW is happening now, the only questions left deal with how much damage will be done – and they tend to produce high estimates.

The answer is, you can’t debate a fact. There can be no valid debate without evidence.

I am pretty glad that more and more people are seen the truth on “global warming is crap; there are more pressing issues”
You have a pretty good blog. I stumbled upon this when I was searching for any research done on the greenhouse effect of molecular water, carbon dioxide and other GH gases. Surprisingly, I DID NOT find any research which considered water vapour as well.. Do you think that you can help me find any research to help me with this?

Such research is common, you can probably start by looking at the sources at the bottom of the Wikipedia article on “global warming”, which also gives greenhouse effectiveness for water vapor and other gases.

Unfortunately, we’ve raised the atmospheric CO2 count about 36% now (that’s fossil carbon from isotopic tests) and that CO2 hangs in the air for 50-100 years – but any excess water vapor we make just falls out as rain. No answers to be found there.

Feedbacks from cloud cover, however, still face some uncertainty, and more work is being done daily.

Carbon emissions have no discernable effect on climate, but our gullibility nets promoters of this “crisis” billions per year. Meanwhile they change nothing of their own lifestyles, though they also live on the planet they claim we are destroying. Claiming to want to save us from our folly, they seek to strip away our freedoms while destroying our economy. While the climate itself mocks their so-called linkages, and our economy is already on the edge of collapse, a Democratic Congress is still pushing for carbon cap legislation. What will it take to bring this farce to an end?

Your website leads me to believe we share the concerns about this attempt to sell out our country for profit and power. Would you help me promote a book I have written examining this hoax? It is intended to make readers angry over being played for patsies. If enough people read it, it would create a public backlash against that legislation, but through my own efforts, I have been unable to sufficiently publicize this work. Would you also pass this e-mail on to all your peers you think might agree and help?

The book is entitled “A Climate Crisis a la Gore” and is organized as follows:

• Introduction – the motivation behind the assembly of this information for public use.
• Part 1 – Excerpted ideas from Mr. Gore’s book, The Assault on Reason. I use Mr. Gore’s own claims regarding the proper and reasonable way to enter an argument or evidence into the marketplace of ideas, the forum of reason, the real power behind democracy.
• Part 2 – A claim by claim analysis of Mr. Gore’s documentary, An Inconvenient Truth. These are evaluated with simple logic, claims elsewhere in the documentary, Mr. Gore’s excerpted written principles of reasoning, and scientific research and findings regarding the subjects of his claims.
• Part 3 – Discussion and disclosure of players and special interest groups creating the perception of a global climate crisis. The history of the movement is examined, motives behind involvement, dollar amounts of profit already being reaped by promoters, and what they stand to gain if America enacts carbon legislation.
• Conclusion – The coming economic storm resulting from enacting this legislation and a plea to readers to contact legislators demanding such laws be reconsidered.

Co2 is not a pollutant despite the way it is portrayed to the general public, it’s a vital part of life on this planet.

Some people think that manmade Co2 is the ‘primary’ cause of global warming… the debate still rages… science has not settled this question… and the argument has been substantially weakened over the last couple of years as new data has emerged.

However it is the political dimension which I find concerning… I’m very much in favour of us becoming more energy efficiant, and moving towards renewable resources, it makes sense. But is it fair to cap the co2 emissions of 2nd/3rd world countries whose co2 output per capita is substantially less than 1/20th of ours?

Some of these countries have yet even to develop into a self-sufficiant agricultural economy. Once again they are going to be denied the chance to develop by 1st world countries. That is, I believe, what is behind the political pressure to get a treaty in place throughout the whole world…

…frankly it doesn’t matter what you or anyone else say… the powers-that-be will force through this treaty over the next couple of years, irrispective that the scientific community is still researching the matter. Cap-and-trade will become a world reality… peoples of the 2nd/3rd world will be denied the chance of cheap energy… and the opportunity to develop…

That was always the point… limit their development, limit the growth of their populations.

“Isn’t a warmer Earth invariably going to lead to a mass disruption of life? Or isn’t the mere risk that it could lead to a mass disruption of life reason enough to avoid it?”

The scientific and other materials I have read to date do not appear clear that warming will create mass disruption of life on Earth (as I understand your question). There are arguments each way on this issue, but I seem to recall seeing materials on ecology and so forth when I was in university studying environmental engineering (more than 20 years ago) that there has generally been greater diversity in times of warmth. I also seem to recall seeing information that indicated larger creatures tended to be more prevalent during cold (glacial) periods as a means to better maintain body heat. Then too, there’s also the issue of physical space. How many creatures are well-equipped to live in exceptionally cold climates? If a glaciation occurs, and glaciers advance, with conditions becoming too cold for many species to survive in those areas, cold-sensitive creatures will likely migrate elsewhere, to warmer areas. If so, conditions become a bit more crowded and competition for more limited food supplies would seem to possibly become the limiting factor. It would seem that the reverse situation would provide potential for greater food supplies for all creatures, starting with plants and small animals. For example, in the past several decades, as hunting is restricted year by year (whether I don’t approve or do means little), we see increasing numbers of deer struck by cars on the roadways, and we also see increasing numbers of near-starving deer eating [expensive] landscaping close to homes during relatively harsh winters. This is presumably due to overpopulation and overcrowding of their ranges, as well as human infringment on large tracts of undeveloped space, forcing the deer to forage farther.

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